Why the Spirit is THE Truth

In this week’s Gospel reading from John, Jesus gets specific: It’s not just a “spirit of niceness” or a “spirit of kindness” or a “spirit that will make you feel warm and fuzzy.”

What Jesus says about this wonderful entity that will be “our Advocate… forever” is that this entity is “the Spirit of truth [my emphasis added].” This is a repeated theme in John, not only in this 14th Chapter but, for instance, in Chapter 4, where John tells us we “must worship in spirit and truth.”

Indeed, as I have written here before, this is a crucial theme, perhaps the crucial theme, that John sets up from the very beginning of his Gospel. When John writes that “in the beginning, there was the Word,” he was using (for “the Word”) the Greek “logos,” in what I explained was “the common Greek understandings of ‘logos’ to mean ‘right reason’ or ‘knowledge’ – or something that is rightly or logically in order (rather than disorder). Or, put another way, ‘logos’ means wisdom, a concept usually connected with deep and utter truth.”

A few verses after that, John repeated the theme: “Grace and truth came through Jesus Christ.”

And, of course and most famously, John recorded Jesus saying that He is “the way, the truth and the life.”

Why this emphasis on truth, and what are its deeper meanings?

The context is important. Throughout this week’s passage, Jesus is talking about the Spirit/truth abiding with and in (or, in combination, within) all avid believers. This same idea is in this week’s other readings, as in Paul saying that “in Him we live and move and have our being,” and also (somewhat similarly) in 1 Peter’s assurance that “good conduct in Christ” and “the hope that is in you” is related to a “good consciencheree” that comes from God “through the resurrection of Jesus Christ.”…

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